


Dear Oxygen ~//~ Draco Malfoy

by am_poke



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Diary, F/M, Werewolf
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-10
Updated: 2017-07-03
Packaged: 2018-10-30 11:04:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10875453
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/am_poke/pseuds/am_poke
Summary: Dear Oxygen,I think you're suffocating me.The diary, the story, the life of a girl whose world is being torn down. Her family, freedom, and secrets ripped out of her arms one by one.





	1. Entry 1: Dear Mum

Dear Mum,

It takes the moon 29 days to rotate around the earth, appearing to us only in fractions of its full self. They taught me not to bury my demons on the dark side of the moon. They told me not to take my one thousand lives for granted just because I think there will one thousand more. They reminded me that I’d just built up this world of magic because my life was so tragic.

This isn’t a stream of consciousness. This is me telling you what the Muggle therapist told me after the last session.

The Malfoy’s say that no one in the wizarding community can know about my condition for now. It must stay between us.

As far as the Muggle knows, I was attacked by a bear. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, whatever that means.

Lucius agrees that I’m just freaking myself out. I’m worrying myself over nothing, he’s told me. It’s nothing until the full moon comes around and my best friend is suddenly scared of me.

Sometimes I see Draco staring at my scars while we’re talking. Sometimes he looks away. Ashamed, afraid, guilty. I can never tell. All I know is that his gray eyes turn a darker shade when we talk about it. A shade of gray that makes my stomach turn.

Mum, my best friend is becoming more distant as the days go on and I’ve got no control over it. All I want is to go back to when I was attacked. I only wish that I had gone back to Malfoy Manor at curfew.

All of this could have been avoided if it hadn’t been for my stupid Slytherin pride.

 

Lucius and I arrived at Malfoy Manor with a loud crack. Narcissa met us by the door, “How was therapy, Kennedy?”

“They gave her some ludicrous Muggle remedy for her depression.”

I nodded and held up the bottle of pills, “Fun, isn’t it?”

Narcissa reached for them, “I’ll go dispose of them.”

“Can I show them to Draco first? He’ll get a kick out of them.”

She pursed her lips, but nodded anyways, “I suppose. Bring them back down at supper though.”

I smiled and ran up the stairs to the first bedroom. Before I knocked on the door with the silver plaque reading D.L.M., I tucked the pills deep in my pocket.

“Kenn?”

“Can I come in?”

“Yes.”

I opened the door and looked to the white-blond haired boy perched on a desk.

“How was therapy?”

I snorted and threw myself on the green-duvet covered bed, “Joyous. I can’t imagine a better way to be spending my time.” I picked up a book on his nightstand, that he quickly snatched away. “You know that I don’t care about your reading habits right? I read Muggle novels too.”

“Lucius Malfoy isn’t your father.”

“You seem to forget that our fathers were best friends. They were very similar in personality.”

I could practically hear him gritting his teeth. Feel the gears in his brain trying to put on the breaks before he accidentally insulted me.

“I don’t care, you know? I mean, about my parents. I never knew them, so I’ve got no reason to care what you say about them.”

“I was just going to say that if your father had lived long enough to raise you, that would make sense. You know how mine is. Pure Blood or nothing.”

I quirked an eyebrow, “You act like you haven’t been following in suit all these years. Let’s not forget about you making a list of Mudbloods you thought deserved to die in the chamber of secrets last year.”

“Brainwashed, as you like to say,” he grinned at me. “Or maybe I’ve been learning from the best damn prejudiced there is. Who knows?”

“Oh, Draco Malfoy. What are we going to do with you?”

He pressed a hand to his heart, “Worship the ground I walk on, obviously.”

I sat up, “You know what I think?”

“That my mother’s been bleaching my hair in my sleep since I was young? Yeah, you’ve voiced that theory many times.”

You know, sometimes I wonder what advice you’d have given me in situations like this, mum. Should I have said what I wanted instead of chickening out and saying what he wanted to hear?

I wanted so badly to tell him that he wasn’t like his father. That he was so much better, more pure than Lucius. I didn’t though.

“It’s got to be true. No one’s hair is that color!”

As silence fell over us, Draco’s eyes trailed over the deep lines on my face. I looked away, “I didn’t choose to look like this. I’d get rid of them if I could.”

“I didn’t-”

“I can always see when you look at them.”

He swallowed, “I don’t mean to-”

“Are you scared of me, Draco?”

I knew my face mirrored his when he turned red.

“I’m not afraid.”

“For a Slytherin, you’re a really bad liar.”

He forced a smile, “I mean it, Kennedy. I’m not afraid. It’s just- I’m not used to it yet.”

“It’s been months! I’ve been through four transformations.”

He moved from the desk to the bed, next to me, “I’m worried for you.”

“I’m fine. Not dead yet,” I deadpanned.

“You haven’t been to school yet. What will everyone think?”

I shrugged, “Why would I care what they think? I’m the quiet, bookworm, Slytherin who trails behind you, Crabbe, and Goyle. No one’s going to pay attention. You wouldn’t have noticed…”

My hands started to shake in one of the four emotions I’d felt so strongly after I’d been attacked.

Anger, Sadness, Grief, and Vengeance.

I hated it. I hated him. I hated myself. I didn’t hate Draco though. As much as I wanted to feel like he’d been horrible to me, he’d been the only one really there for me.

“Kenn,” he whispered. “We’ve been best friends since we were born. Talk to me, please.”

“You’d hate me for asking.”

He shook his head, “Anything. Ask me anything.”

“Hug me.”

He looked taken aback, “Why?”

“So I don’t feel so cold. So I’m not alone in this for once.”

He nodded and pulled me into his chest, “You’ve been reading too much, Kennedy. Only people in books are as dramatic as you.”

Back to the not so stream of consciousness, everything seemed the be going in fast forward that night. Not much of it I remember.

Tears of moonlight stained Draco’s shirt that night and Narcissa’s eyes seemed to look right through me when I didn’t bring my pills back down during supper. No one questioned Draco’s change of wardrobe or my glowing red face that night. Not until I sneezed into my pumpkin juice.

“Are you getting sick, dear?” Narcissa questioned, pressing the back of her palm against my forehead.

I snorted, “I’ve been sick for about four months now in case you haven’t noticed.”

Lucius glared at me, “We will not discuss that under this roof.”

“Fine, I’ll go outside.”


	2. Entry 2: Dear Daddy

Dear Daddy,

Anger, Sadness, Grief, and Vengeance. I think I’ll always keep going back to those four emotions. Mix that in with a little sarcasm and that’s a day in my life.

Walking through the barrier, I thought I knew what was going to happen. People were going to stare, I was going to hide my face in a book, and Draco was going to distance himself.

I found some pictures of myself from when I was younger. You always wrote notes on the back of them. Always.

One was a picture of Draco and I when were were almost two, both of us with genuine smiles plastered on our nearly toothless faces. You’d written on the back, “Never hide your smile for someone who doesn’t deserve to see you frown.”

I always thought it’d be easy to listen to you. I always thought it’d be so easy just to put on a fake smile even when I was scared or angry.

That doesn’t work anymore. Not when it takes all of my energy to say a sentence without my voice breaking or my head spinning.

I stared down at my trunk while I made my way to the train.

I didn’t think that I’d be so embarrassed. No, I promised myself that I wouldn’t be embarrassed. I was too proud to let it bother me. My human side seemed to be winning over my Slytherin side though.

Someone’s hands slammed into my trunk, stopping me in my tracks.

“Hey, Kenn. Missed you over the summer.”

I groaned, “Watch it.”

“Sassy today? That’s okay. I’m patience,” Marcus Flint gave me a nasty grin.

“How very Hufflepuff of you,” I snorted. He shoved me back and I looked up, “I thought I said-”

His face showed nothing but fear, “What happened to you?”

“Does it bother you? I hope so. Maybe you’ll leave me alone now.”

The Quidditch team captain nodded and started backing away, “No problem there. Not while you look like that.”

I pushed past him and continued to the train. After loading my trunk, I went to the train’s bathroom and locked the door.

Sadness. Vengeance.

Pride meant nothing to me in a locked train bathroom where I had a breakdown within the first three minutes I’d been around my peers.

I was never as strong as you and mum. Daddy, I wish you were here to fix all of this for me.

There was a light knock at the bathroom door and I dragged in a gulp of air into my tired lungs, “One minute!”

“Kenn? Someone told me Flint was bothering you.”

I pulled the door was open, “Are you sure that it’s not too late for me to transfer schools? You know, to somewhere where no one knows me or what I used to look like.”

Draco shook his head and threw an arm around his shoulder, “Just stay around me. I scare everyone.”

“Everyone but Potter,” I muttered, a grin on my face.

“But if Potter even looks at you wrong, I’ll kill him.”

I rolled my eyes, “You say that too much for it to be true. But hey, you stopped slicking back your hair to the point that it looks greasy. You get respect points for that.”

“I still can’t believe you didn’t tell me how ridiculous I looked.”

“I was always dropping hints.”

As we neared our compartment, I looked towards the floor.

“I’ll beat them up if they say anything,” Draco promised.

“That’s not what I’m worried about.”

He smirked at me, “You worried about what Nott’s going to think about you?”

I could feel myself blush, “I do not fancy him!”

“Blaise, then?”

I gagged, “In his dreams.”

“Please don’t tell me it’s Crabbe or Goyle.”

“I don’t fancy any of them, Draco. I’m worried about what Pansy’s going to think. She’s one of the only female friends I’ve ever been able to keep.”

He pulled the compartment door opened, “Well, trust me, keeping your face hidden by books isn’t going to help anything.”

“You found her, I see,” Zabini said. “Where were you hiding, Kennedy? You had Malfoy’s panties in a twist.”

I slid into the window seat next to Draco, “Bathroom.”

“Crying it seems,” Nott pointed out. “Flint has that effect on everyone. Just looking at that face could make the strongest man in the world break into tears.” I glanced up at Theo Nott and his smile faltered. “Merlin, Kenn. What happened to you?”

I looked the Draco, who said nothing but, “She got hurt.”

“No kidding. Looks like you got attacked by something.”

“I really don’t want to talk about it.”

I swallowed when they started looking between each other.

Draco popped his knuckles, “Anyone who’s got a problem with it can talk to me.”

“Chill, Malfoy. We’re not judging your little girlfriend,” Pansy snorted.

“Incest is weird, even for wizards,” Theo grinned at us.

Draco raised an eyebrow, “You think that’s funny?”

“That your family goes to the extent of marrying cousins to keep the bloodline pure? Yeah. Hilarious.”

I snorted, “That’d be funny if we were related.”

“You’re not related?” Zabini asked.

“No! Our parents were best friends in school. We grew up together, like siblings, but we are in no way related,” Draco explained.

“My hair may be blonde, but it’s not bleached.”

Draco glared at me, “Original.”

I grinned and looked back to my book. The words were blurring across the page though. I stared out the window instead. 

A chill ran up my body and everything started going in slow motion.

A black blur was running past the train window. Quick, sudden, and unimaginable. It seemed like blood had been smeared across the window, but I knew it was just my eyes rolling back in my head. My thoughts started looking more like unfocused pictures and blood was rushing in my ears.

Just as soon as it appeared in front of my eyes, it was gone, fangs and all. My crazy imagination, mixing with the oatmeal I’d had that morning, I suddenly started feeling that and bile burning my throat.

I had to remind myself that nothing was real.

My eyes focused back on the window, looking through it first. I looked towards the trees and grass and the ever so normal scenery outside the window. The black blur was no where. Just an imaginary figment of my mind.

In the reflection of the window, I saw my face. Scarred, broken, destroyed.

My mind flashed between the past and the present, the choices I made and what I could have done differently.

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. I didn’t want to believe that I’d have to deal with something so horrible for the rest of my life.

The buzzing in my ears faded and I turned my gazes back to my book. The words of the other Slytherins in the compartment didn’t even make a dent on what I was thinking about.

The sound of the train wheels squealing to a halt hit me though.

I looked up at the others, “Why’s the train stopping?”

Theo stood up and looked out the compartment door, “Someone’s getting on.”

People towards the front of the train started screaming. When the air started to freeze in place, I knew.

“Dementors. Looking for Sirius Black.”

“How do you know?”

Then the hooded figure opened our compartment door.


	3. Entry 3: Dear Mum

Dear Mum,

Draco’s nothing but a bleached haired git. I still love him though. As the closest thing to a brother that I’ve got left, I have to love him.

As if torturing Potter wasn’t enough, Draco suddenly felt the need to make himself look foolish in front of him too.

“You couldn’t have just let him fly the bloody thing?”

Draco glared at me, “Him and that bloody chicken can go rot in hell together. They’re the perfect pairing, hot headed and stupid looking.”

I looked at his arm as Madam Pomfrey bandaged it, “It’ll be fine, Mr. Malfoy. No serious damage. Just try to rest it for the next few days.”

He nodded and the two of us left the infirmary together. A group of Slytherin girls, including Pansy, came rushing up to him.

“Are you okay, Draco?”

“Oh! It looks like it hurts!”

“How could that stupid beast hurt someone as handsome as you?”

He pulled a pout, “I’m lucky they didn’t have to amputate it. Hurts like hell, you know?”

I snorted, “See you around, Malfoy.”

I met Blaise and Theo in the library. I noticed them both looked away from me for a few seconds as I entered and avoided looking towards my face afterwards.

It hurt. I won’t deny that. I’ve never considered my Slytherin pride a gift.

“You know, I can tell when you won’t look at me. I’ve got scars. They’re not going away. Deal with it or stay the hell away from me.”

Theo chuckled, “I don’t remember you ever talking much before. Much less, standing up for yourself. Your attack get to your brain?”

That was true. Did you realize when I was younger how shy I was? Or were you gone before my antisocial behavior started to show? I never can remember what I was like when you and daddy were around. Sometimes I have trouble remembering you at all.

I nodded, “Yes, actually. It made me realize that if I can survive a were-” I caught myself. “If I can survive a severe animal attack, I can put a bloke in his place when I need to.”

Blaise looked me in the face and tilted his head, “Good luck with that one, Kennedy.”

I pulled a book out of my bag and started my homework while the other two tried to finish an essay they hadn’t even started.

“You know, it always helps to finish essays when they’re assigned instead of when they’re due,” I muttered.

“Says Miss. Top Of The Class.”

I glared at Theo, “Hermione Granger is top of the class. I’m no good in Herbology.”

He snorted, “You’re doing better than she is in Divination.”

“We don’t do anything in Divination,” I said, eyebrow raised.

“My point exactly. She dropped the other day.”

I set my book down, “Granger dropped a class?”

The two grinned, “That’s what we hear at least. Some are saying she’s just been threatening to drop. But either way, a class as stupid as Divination is causing little Granger a great deal of trouble.”

“Typical Gryffindor.”

After that break we all went to the DADA class where Professor Lupin was. We’d heard about the Boggart from the other class. It seemed easy enough to me. I’d seen Lucius deal with a few in Malfoy Manor.

After going through the basic Q&A, he took us to the room with cupboard. I stood slightly behind Theo, watching the cupboard shake and rattle.

One of the more shy Ravenclaws stood up first, watching the black mass turn into a large rat. She yelped before yelling the jinx and watching the rat turn into a stuffed animal.

I waited behind Pansy, Blaise, Draco, and Theo.

After Theo’s awkward experience seeing a man wearing a mask that we could all assume was his father, I was next.

Professor Lupin’s head tilted to the side while the Boggart transformed.

Not at all was I surprised, nor was I feeling much more than discomfort when a large man appeared. He was quite hairy and his smile revealed blood covered fangs.

My head twitch involuntarily when I saw his eyes, “Ridiculous!”

I felt ringing in my ears as I backed away from the Boggart. Draco put his good hand on my shoulder, “Are you-”

“Fine. I’m fine. But I swear that if Lupin tries to stop me after class, I might snap. Smells weird. I think he might be- never mind.”

When class was over, I was the first out of the class. Draco followed me into the Slytherin common room.

“Do you need-”

I shook my head, “No. I don’t need to talk about it. I’m fine. Just… scared.”

“I was going to ask if you needed a hug,” he muttered, his pale cheeks turning an obvious shade of red even with the greenish tint of the common room.

“You don’t like being touched.”

He shrugged, “You’re my best friend and you’re obviously upset.”

“You don’t like being touched,” I repeated.

“Goddammit, Kennedy. I’m trying to be a good friend. Take it or leave it.”

I grinned at me and stepped into his thin arms. Draco held me against his chest while I tried to dispose of all negative thoughts.

“You’re so cold, Kenn,” he muttered.

“Full moon tomorrow.”

He nodded, “What are you going to do?”

“We’ll figure that out when we get there.”


	4. Entry 4: Dear Moon

Dear Moon,

Once upon a time, Draco and I sat in his backyard, staring up at you and your friends. It hurts now to think back at the days that I didn’t look at you and think about all of the pain you’ve caused me.

Now I pass windows in the corridors and see that you’re fading for the day, waiting until the sun goes down again. I dread the time when the sun goes down because I have to see you again. Something once so beautiful now looks like nothing but a form of torture.

I feel my heart drop to my knees when someone brushes against me. My neck gives an involuntary tick when I go outside. My hands and feet ache with the need to transform.

Sitting between Theo and Draco, I feel my heart racing in my chest, blood rushing in my ears, and the whispers of the class bouncing around my head like rubber ball.

The smell of unsuccessful potions burns my nose. My nose twitches like the dog I’m soon to become.

I looked down at the side of my cauldron that I’d been gripping while I stirred. It was mangled and appeared to have melted under my touch. It was like a crumpled sheet of paper under the touch of the full moon.

Draco looked at it too. Then he looked at me, opening his mouth. I shook my head and forced the words out of my throat, “Don’t say anything. I didn’t mean to.”

“You need to get out of the castle. Hideout in the Forbidden Forest or something until nightfall.”

“I can’t. Draco, if I stop showing up to classes every full moon someone’s going to figure it out. No one’s allowed to figure it out.”

He frowned deeper at me, “You’re going to drive yourself crazy, Kenn. Please be careful.”

“I know my limits. I’ll know when it’s getting too much for me.” He reluctantly nodded as Snape began instructing us to bottle our potions. “Will you bottle mine? I might break the vial.”

Draco put our identical potions into vials and took them to the front of the class. I cleaned out our cauldrons with a swish of my wand and waited anxiously for the bell to ring.

I could feel my nails digging into my palms. Probably drawing blood. It didn’t phase me much.

It almost drove me mental to think that it was only lunch time though.

I was scared to eat. I didn’t know how it affected me. Instead of eating, I rested my head on the Slytherin table and closed my eyes.

With every yell or crash of a plate I was scared that I might attack someone out of unintended anger.

“Kenn?” Draco whispered, setting a hand on my shoulder. There was a jerk at the table as my anger began to boil and soon cold hands were lifting my face up.

My best friend looked at me with scared gray eyes, “You just growled at me Kennedy. And… and your eyes are different. Yellow. Please, go somewhere safe.”

“I’m scared, Draco,” I whispered. “I don’t want to hurt anything.”

“I’ll be waiting for you in the Entrance Hall in the morning. I just want you to be safe.”

I smiled a little, “How very Hufflepuff of you.”

Draco glared at me, “Would you like me to go sacrifice you to the Centaurs?”

“Ah! There’s the Draco I know.”

~//~

True to his word, Draco had broken the rules of being in the corridors after curfew. But when he saw me limping towards the castle, his searching expression changed to worry in seconds.

“I don’t know what I did,” I cried, when he reached me. “I don’t know what I did, but this isn’t my blood.”

Draco lifted my chin and touched a spot on my neck. I flinched away, pain burning my body.

“Some of it is yours, Kennedy. We need to get you cleaned up and then see if we can stop the bleeding.”

He helped me into the Slytherin common room and then up to the boy’s dorms. Crabbe and Goyle had already left for their first breakfast of the day, but do to it being early Saturday morning, Theo and Blaise were still fast asleep.

Draco locked the bathroom door and started the water in the bathtub. Against my better judgement, I looked into the mirror. I looked at the scars and the blood and the hatred in my eyes.

It was almost half an hour before I stopped the bile from spilling out of my throat.

Draco was scared, I could see that. I wanted nothing more than to deal with my issues by myself. But something inside me told me that there was no way I’d ever be able to deal with any of it by myself.

There was a sense of self preservation inside of me, but my human side seemed to override that.

My human side seemed to be overriding my Slytherin side a lot.

That day I slept in the boy’s common room, afraid to go back to my own with Pansy there to ask questions.

I only woke up when I hit the floor, “What the hell? Did you just push me off the bed?”

Theo glared at me from his position by his bed, “Yeah. I did.”

“Why?!” I yelled at him.

“You were talking in your sleep. You’re not the only one trying to sleep around here.”

I stood up, “Well, unlike you, I didn’t spend the night jacking off. I didn’t have the choice to sleep last night.”

He grabbed my wrist before I could reach for my wand, “Did you get in a fight?”

“What are you talking about, Theodore?”

“You’ve got a black eye and you were- well you were yelling your sleep. Yelling for someone to stop.”

More like something, I thought.

I shrugged, “I honestly have no answer.”

Theo looked me over closely, “Take care of yourself, Kenn.”

 


	5. Entry 5: Dear Professor Trelawney

Dear Professor Trelawney,

I am one Divination lesson away from throwing myself off the Astronomy Tower. I’ve recently come to realize why Granger has been threatening to drop your class.

Reading bloody tea leaves will never work for me. Not when I’ve gotten the Gallows three times in a row and you’ve announced to my entire class that I’m going to die within the next year.

“My scars show roots to my death!”

“It’s all written in the lines of my face!”

“The claws that left the marks engraved in my skin will be the ones that take my life completely.”

Blaise and Theo had even started making jokes about how no one wanted to be around me anymore. Everyone thought some imaginary beast was going to come crashing through the castle ready to slay me at any moment.

“Watch out everyone! Today we might find out exactly when Kennedy dies of attack by dinosaur!” Blaise called out before the class began.

I rolled my eyes, “Muggle fairy tales now? How creative.”

You know what your glasses make you look like? A fly. Your personality matches too.

Annoying, droning, something I’d love to smack…

For the first half of class we’d all thought you’d dropped the subject of my fate. To my discomfort, you only decided to get closer to me.

I feel worse for Theo than I do for myself. I was clutching his wrist the entire four minutes that you were sat in front of me.

Your fingers ran down my face in the most chilling way possible, “It’s written in your face. In the scars left by someone less than a man.”

I hadn’t even noticed I’d done anything until the people in the classroom started screaming. You stood up quickly, staring at me with those crazy bug eyes. The bangles hand from your wrists rattled loudly as you ran a shaking hand over the bruise forming on your arm.

Every fiber in me seemed to be trying to escape the body that I no longer wanted. I hated it. I hated that you were the person that let out all of the anger I never knew I had. I hated that I went from being the quiet, know it all, to the person everyone was so afraid of.

"Kennedy,” Blaise muttered to me.

I shook my head, “I-I didn’t mean to.”

Theo put his hand on my back, “Let’s get out of here. We’ll talk to Snape. See if we can get into a class with a more sane teacher.”

I grabbed my bag and left between the two. We were three of the seven Slytherin 3rd years who had been stupid enough to take your class. Now I was dropping to Granger’s level. I’d never even thought that I’d could bare to drop a class before. Not until I met you.

“Kenn, you’re shaking,” Theo said, his hand still rested on my back.

“I’ve never been so angry before. I didn’t even know what happened.”

Blaise laughed, “That old bat brings out the worst in people. She got what she deserved.”

I smiled a little, “I think I like it better with you two defending me instead of just doing what Draco tells you to do.”

“It’s easier to talk to and defend people when they show their personalities instead of hiding them behind books,” Theo said.

I snorted, “It’s not like there’s anything special about my personality anyways. I’m violent, emotional, and proud.”

“Yeah, you’re basically a girl version of Draco. The only difference is that you don’t obsess over Potter, nor do you expect all of us to praise the ground you walk on.”

I shrugged, “Draco comes from a house of power. He was raised thinking that everyone’s below him, and that’s how he acts.”

“That’s how most Slytherins were raised. It’s a Pureblood thing. Lucius is different though.”

Theo looked towards the ground, “Ex Death Eater.”

“It’s not even that,” I said, glaring at him. “It’s the way he feels the need to drill it into his only son’s brain. Drill in the fact that if Draco doesn’t live up to the Malfoy name, he’ll be disowned. As crazy as it sounds, the only reason Sirius Black turned out the way that he did is because his parents did the same thing. They disowned him at sixteen because he didn’t agree with their standards of blood status. Now he’s a runaway Azkaban prisoner.”

The two became silent until we reached the dungeons.

“I’m not saying that we deserve to let Draco walk all over us. I’m saying that it’s not his fault that he expects us to let him.”

Blaise threw himself onto the emerald green couch, “I guess you know him best, Kennedy.”

“Trust me, I know him better than he knows himself. It’s pathetic, honestly.” I curled up at the edge of the couch by Blaise’s feet. “And I’m wouldn’t be surprised if he’d say the same thing about me.”

I pulled a book out of my backpack and opened it.

“You are your bloody Muggle novels,” Theo muttered.

I peaked over the top of the book, “If only you knew who got me into Muggle novels.”

“You don’t mean… Malfoy reads Muggle novels?”

I shrugged and hid back behind my book, “I didn’t say that.”

The two boys grinned at each other.

“If you bring it up to him I will skin both of you alive.”

Every thought of you had faded from our minds until dinner rolled around. I’d gotten distracted with my current book… and throwing rolls at Draco while he wasn’t paying attention. I was completely and totally unaware that there were three professors standing behind me until Theo and Blaise became still.

“Good luck, Kenn,” Theo whispered to me as I left the Great Hall with Professors Dumbledore, Snape, and Lupin.

I was brought up to the headmaster’s office and offered a chair and some sweets.

“Listen, if this is about what happened in Divination today-”

“Ms. Prewett, you’re not in trouble. We just wanted to ask you a few questions,” Professor Lupin said.

Dumbledore nodded, “If you wouldn’t mind me asking, why didn’t you show up to your last few classes on Friday?”

I swallowed, “I wasn’t feeling well.”

“Some of the professors have said that they noticed bruises and cuts when you came back to class on Monday.”

Snape nodded in agreement, “Deep cuts, specifically on your face.”

“I took a hard fall on the Quidditch pitch.”

“And on Saturday I was informed that there had been a fight between two unknown creatures in the Forbidden Forest.”

I did my best to look surprised, “Really? Did you find out what they were?”

“Ms. Prewett, I saw who your Boggart turned into. You’re not the first student here who Fenrir Greyback has attacked.”

I held my head up higher, “I’m not going to lie, I had an encounter with Greyback over the summer. I wasn’t bitten though.”

“And it was Greyback that left the scars on your face, yes?” Snape questioned.

I knew what Lucius would do if he found out I told. I knew how much trouble I’d be in.

“No. I was being careless. Wandering around a Muggle populated forest in the middle of the night. I was attacked by a bear.”

The words that I’d been coached into saying. They poured out of my mouth without a second thought.

“A bear?” Dumbledore laughed. “I’m sure St. Mungo’s could have cleared up the scars in a heartbeat.”

I entered the Slytherin common room almost three hours later. My head was spinning and I was growing clammier the more I thought about the consequences for my actions.

Maybe I’d be given a little slack for the forces used against me. Veritaserum wasn’t something we’d spoken about.

“You’ve been gone a while,” Pansy commented as I entered the dorm.

I must have apologized a million times for punching that hole into the wall.


End file.
